Liberal Democrat County Councillors in Surrey have today voted against proposals put forward by the Independent Remuneration Panel (IRP). The report published by the IRP recommended that a Special Responsibility Allowance (SRA) of £10,000 be allocated to Deputy Cabinet Members, a set of roles only introduced to Surrey County Council in May this year.

Liberal Democrat County Councillor, David Goodwin, said:

"It is interesting to note that the IRP didn't recommend these SRAs in October last year but have since changed their stance. In the last Council term (which ended in early May 2017), 51 of the 60 Conservative County Councillors were in receipt of one form of SRA or another. These new SRAs further boost the pockets of Conservative Councillors at a time when the same councillors are proposing major cuts to essential services including children's centres, libraries, bus travel and community recycling centres*. This is in our view totally unacceptable."

NOTES

*The public consultations surrounding the proposed cuts are open until 4th January 2019 and can be found here.